UNDYING BEAUTY
They did their best
And they are blest,—
The sap, the shoots,
The little leaves and roots;
The benign breath,
The touch of light,—
All worked in amity
To grow the rose’s beauty.
Watch its splendor,
Its undying grandeur,
The Infinite Face
That peeps through its little case;—
Watch not in grief
Its falling petals or its brief
Sojourn here;—
For its career
Done, its duty ends;
Toward the Immortals’ home it tends.
The sap dried,
The summer petals fled,
Its body pines;
Yet its death ’s divine;
Through death and spurns
Its deathless glory won:
The rose is dead,—
Its beauty lives instead.
And they are blest,—
The sap, the shoots,
The little leaves and roots;
The benign breath,
The touch of light,—
All worked in amity
To grow the rose’s beauty.
Watch its splendor,
Its undying grandeur,
The Infinite Face
That peeps through its little case;—
Watch not in grief
Its falling petals or its brief
Sojourn here;—
For its career
Done, its duty ends;
Toward the Immortals’ home it tends.
The sap dried,
The summer petals fled,
Its body pines;
Yet its death ’s divine;
Through death and spurns
Its deathless glory won:
The rose is dead,—
Its beauty lives instead.